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Jobs figure discrepancy prompts CSO rethink

THE Central Statistics Office (CSO) is to overhaul the way it calculates employment figures amid concerns that it has over-estimated the number of new jobs in the public sector, inadvertantly embarrassing the Department of Finance in the process.

The latest CSO quarterly national household survey shows a 12,100 increase in employment in the health sector and a total public-sector rise of 45,000. This appeared to fly in the face of promises made by Charlie McCreevy, the finance minister, to reduce public- sector employment. Subsequently, the department released its own figures, which showed only a slight rise to 279,991 last December, about 700 more than at the end of 2002.

It is understood the majority of the new jobs identified by the CSO were created in the public sector but that they were outsourced to the private sector, something the CSO would not have picked up using its normal procedures. The